What's the best way to learn Final Cut Studio?

[TruEsTaR]

Like I said in another thread, I decided on buying the newest version of Final Cut Studio.
It has Final Cut Pro 7, Motion 4, Soundtrack Pro 3, Color 1.5, Compressor 3.5, and Dvd Studio Pro 4 in it.

My question is, what is the best way to teach yourself FCS? I purchased The Apple Pro Series books on Sound Editing in Final Cut Studio, Motion 4, and Final Cut Pro 7. I also picked Edward Dmytryk's "On Film Editing", Larry Jordan's "Final Cut Pro Power Skills", and already had Gael Chandler's "Cut by Cut".

Is this enough of a starting point alone with youtube tutorials and messing around with my own projects?

A friend of mine who went to college told me it would take me about 1-2 years to learn final cut pro 7 and be decent with editing. My buddy's sister who went to an Ivy league school told me If I worked at it enough and had some natural talent, that I could become good enough to do decent editing in about 4 months. I realize it will depend on a lot of factors, but how long did it take all of you to get familiar with the software? And for some of you, how long did it take to master it?

*note, I have absolutely NO experience editing.

godspeed,

TS

 

[Utopia]

Here's what you do.

Take note.

Ready?...

Read the manual and use it while you read the manual, doing the actions and DOINGNESS of what you read in the manual.

I also don't know what college and an Ivy League school has to do with making movies or using Final Cut Pro.

I learn new things about Pro Tools every day and I have been using it intensely for 8 years. You never stop learning.

Practice, practice, practice. It's a stupid man who thinks he knows it all.

 

[Cracker Funk]

Is this enough of a starting point alone with youtube tutorials and messing around with my own projects?

A friend of mine who went to college told me it would take me about 1-2 years to learn final cut pro 7 and be decent with editing.

My buddy's sister who went to an Ivy league school told me If I worked at it enough and had some natural talent, that I could become good enough to do decent editing in about 4 months.

I realize it will depend on a lot of factors, but how long did it take all of you to get familiar with the software?

about 1 month

 

[directorik]

If it takes you 1 to 2 years to learn then that's what it takes.
What will you learn if you DON'T work with the software for
the 1 to 2 years?

If it takes you 4 months then that's what it takes.

Does going to an Ivy league school make your buddy's sister
an expert on Final Cut Pro? How long did it take her to master
editing? I wonder where she got her 4 month figure.

I realize it will depend on a lot of factors, but how long did it take all of you to get familiar with the software? And for some of you, how long did it take to master it?

It took me about a month to understand what the software
could do. I have now been editing with Final Cut for 10 years
(over 20 features, nearly 60 music videos and close to 200
other projects) and I am still not willing to say I have mastered
it. I'm pretty comfortable using it, but I'm no master.

I guess I'm not quite sure I understand: what difference does
it make what other people did, or what your buddy's sister thinks
is a reasonable time frame? Take the time you need to get good
at editing and learning the software. 4 months, 1 to 2 years or
even 5 to 7 years.

 

[Utopia]

directorik:

This reminds me of the time I went to a music mixing seminar with Tony Maserati. It was a WAVES plug-ins function with Tony showing off his new plug-ins.

The person they had there from WAVES had a Pro Tools rig and was running it via his laptop and a plugged in mouse.

He was so slow, mis-clicked, and flubbed and didn't do what Tony was telling him to do fast enough (he was showing a song he mixed of Jason Mraz and how he used his waves plug-ins for it) and it was so agonizingly pitiful to watch I almost walked up there to help the poor guy (people were laughing and snickering in the group of attendees).

What you said was 100% true. Who cares what other people say or do? It's your life. It's your tool - learn it in a week if you want to.

 

[knightly]

Here are the targeted pieces to get you started:
1) import footage
2) set in and out points on the clips
3) add the clip to the time line
4) export the project

These 4 things are 90-95% of what you'll do in FCP.

 

[TruEsTaR]

Thanks for the input....

I know it varies with everyone how long it takes to learn anything, but I just wanted to figure out how long it took all of you to get familiar with the software.

I brought up my buddy who said it would take anyone a year to get decent with it to prove to myself that he was wrong....

 

[JHPFilms]

I know how it feels, I just switched from Final Cut Express to Adobe Premiere and After Effects and, it is a whole different ball game. If you want to try using tutorials try the apple website for tutorials. I can also recommend someone on Youtube of the name "pjnproductions" He has tons of final cut express tutorials but, they should all be pretty much the same in Final Cut Studio. However, above all your best bet is to just go out film random things and keep editing! Thats what I am doing with Premiere and After Effects and I am doing well!

 

[knightly]

The 4 bits I mentioned are my boiled down fast learning curve not just for final cut, but for any editing software on the market. If you can do those things, you can edit... it's all the same program over and over, just implemented in slightly different ways. I don't really see a difference between premeire or final cut when I use them, because I focus on those specific skills that will ramp me up the fastest, and they're generally the same from platform to platform.

 

[NathanH]

Honestly, took me a day or two to get to grips with FCP, which was my first experience with an editing program.

It's really just a matter of capturing footage correctly and cutting it up in the right places.

If you've watched enough films you will have a good idea of when to cut. If you've ever used a program like Flash you will get to grips with the timeline fairly fast.

Just jump in and go for it.

 

[ussinners]

It takes as long as it takes.

Where the artistry really comes in, is knowing what pieces to edit together. What works and what doesn't. A good take from a bad take...

Personally with my crappy travel videos, I don't have a choice but use lousy footage I took. It's like the camera won't stop shaking in my hand.

But, if you're editing good movie footage, then it's not the editing it's the art that's difficult.

The trickery comes in when you know that you can fix a problem by using one of these specialty softwares like After Effects.

 

[spinner]

My question is, what is the best way to teach yourself FCS? I purchased The Apple Pro Series books on Sound Editing in Final Cut Studio, Motion 4, and Final Cut Pro 7. I also picked Edward Dmytryk's "On Film Editing", Larry Jordan's "Final Cut Pro Power Skills", and already had Gael Chandler's "Cut by Cut".

I know you have all those books, etc. However, when I was teaching myself FCP, I needed some immediate answers. So even though you have all those, my suggestion--just so you can get started immediately-- get Final Cut Pro for Dummies.

...got me through my first project...

-- spinner

 

[chilipie]

I know you have all those books, etc. However, when I was teaching myself FCP, I needed some immediate answers. So even though you have all those, my suggestion--just so you can get started immediately-- get Final Cut Pro for Dummies.

...got me through my first project...

-- spinner

I've never bought a single software-specific book, but I think I learn how to things more effectively by doing rather than reading. I learnt the very basics of Final Cut after playing around with it for a few days, and then started to refer to the (very detailed) manual when I got stuck on anything more complicated… there are a few websites I've trawled through fairly often (Ken Stone is very good), but otherwise I think I've learnt more by playing around than any other method. I'm sure a book would've been helpful at times, but I've never seen the need - so, to answer your initial question, you're in a very good position to get started.

 

[Randy Ericksen]

I got the Apple Certified tutorial. Went through it step by step. That gave me a good idea how to start. I did my fist full length Doc. Final Cut learning to finished project in 5 months. I also go to the Apple forum most days and learn something new.

 

[bez]

I have learned a solid bit of Adobe Premiere Pro CS 5 in like 8 weeks. Enough to do basic editing and sound editing. That's what I edited my last short with. And at that point I was learning with that short to edit. However I'm a professional with photoshop so the layout of premiere was very familiar to me and I have an software engineering background.

Don't know if it helped but I'm pretty confident in the software. All you have to do is look up tutrials on anything you want to know how to do and you can find them online. Youtube has plenty as well.

 

[TruEsTaR]

I have a great idea of when to cut certain footage, and the book "on film editing" helped a lot, but I know I'll get better through trial and error.

thanks for the input

- d

 

[spinner]

I've never bought a single software-specific book, but I think I learn how to things more effectively by doing rather than reading. I learnt the very basics of Final Cut after playing around with it for a few days, and then started to refer to the (very detailed) manual when I got stuck on anything more complicated.

Sure you learn by doing, but if you don't know what you can do or how to do something, the Dummies series is a good way to start. I've often had something to work on. What I mean is that sometimes I need to know now how to do something, I can figure out why it does it later.


-- spinner

 

[chilipie]

Sure you learn by doing, but if you don't know what you can do or how to do something, the Dummies series is a good way to start. I've often had something to work on. What I mean is that sometimes I need to know now how to do something, I can figure out why it does it later.

Sure, I wouldn't recommend how I learnt it to everyone and although I was learning on the job I didn't have any strict deadlines, which helped. Just thought it was worth mentioning that you don't need lots of expensive books to get the hang of it

 

[Blade_Jones]

I like watching instructional DVD's. Goes a lot faster. It did take me like 3 weeks to read the FCP book. It is SLOOOOW reading! I just read the main manual though -- not all the other manuals that are included. Then when you stumble into problems just post a question in a FCP help forum.

 

[Ernest Worthing]

Being a good editor and knowing how to use an editing program are two very different things.

Like most people said, knowing which angle and take to use and when to cut is going to make most of the difference as you can do basic editing with just marking in and out points and creating a timeline.

Ofcourse the idea is to be able to be a good editor and know ur editing program well so it serves your vision.

But you can start doing basic editing in little time and keep learning over more.